Friday, August 10, 2012

Video: F-35B First Aerial Weapons Release

It happened yesterday with a Marine Corps F-35B. A 1,000 pound bomb from 4,200 feet:

Per Naval Air Systems Command:

"The milestone marks the start of validating the F-35's capability to employ precision weapons and allow pilots to engage the enemy on the ground and in the air ... An aerial weapons separation test checks for proper release of the weapon from its carriage system and trajectory away from the aircraft. It is the culmination of a significant number of prerequisite tests, including ground fit checks, ground pit drops and aerial captive carriage and environment flights to ensure the system is working properly before expanding the test envelope in the air."

2 comments:

Not exactly stealthy with the missile under the wingtip and whatever the clunky thing is under thewingroot... which is one of the conundrums of theshort legged F35: the internal bay that makes it stealthy doesn't hold much.

It's a great aircraft but its price is getting costlier day by day and delivery date is being postponed due to some irrelevant problems. I hope we -Turkey- will be delivered soon. In the meantime you can have a look at some great F-35 photos :